Will This War Never End?

The war in Afghanistan is still raging. US military forces are still patrolling the hills and mountain passes, the local villages and the larger towns and cities. Still fighting. American soldiers are continuing to fight battles in this incessant war. 13 years it has been now. I believe this has been the longest military campaign in the history of this nation.

How much longer can this go on? With ISIS conquering more territory in Syria, and gathering more and more followers and recruiting radicals throughout the middle east, the US is now being dragged deeper into the conflict in the region. There are air strikes and covert special forces operations currently underway. More money is being allocated, to the tune of hundreds of millions of tax payer dollars. ISIS by all accounts is getting stronger, and is starting to gain influence in Iraq.

And oh, Iraq. We supposedly left Iraq nearly 3 years ago. But there is still a training contingent of US troops there, and covert military and intelligence operations are still being conducted. I am beginning to think that this war will continue onward for many years yet, because as more Muslim extremists join groups like ISIS, the greater and more involved the US military presence will be. Then the mullahs and religious leaders will preach to their flock, who will point to that imperialist foreign presence in their country, and then those poor, especially young and unemployed men will get all riled up and go join ISIS, thus prompting a greater US military force to be dispatched, which will lead to yet more collateral damage in the region, which will inflame another round of radicalized men into extremism and perhaps terrorism against the US. It is a cycle that repeats itself, you see, round and round we go. It is like this is becoming normal now. The permanent and accepted state of things. Yep, the US is at war in the middle-east. Has been, and always will be. Just the way it is and is meant to be.